68 A RAFT PILOT'S LOG 



from the river, and these were run down by gravity to 

 the river bank, and dumped into barges, holding 1500 

 to 2000 bushels. These barges were towed over to Le- 

 Claire by the handsome little steamer "Jennie Gil- 

 christ." This coal was found at the right time to help 

 steamboating on the Upper Mississippi, especially the 

 rafting. The raft-boats could fill up on excellent coal 

 at LeClaire, at eight cents a bushel, or two dollars a 

 ton on the barge. Some of the boats could carry enough 

 coal to make the round trip up to Beef Slough and 

 back, while others would have to take on wood up river. 



There were many regular wood yards, where good, 

 dry wood was ranked, close to the water, to supply boats 

 landing for it at any time, day or night. The most no- 

 table wood landings were Harringtons (below Belle- 

 vue), Finley's (above Dubuque), Saint Louis wood- 

 yard (below Guttenberg), Frenchtown, Clayton, Dave 

 Morrell's (at the mouth of the Wisconsin river), Fred 

 Worth's and Dave Worth's (above McGregor). At 

 Lynxville, Wisconsin, Tom Bright and Lish Randall 

 had wood flats loaded ready to be taken in tow and 

 unloaded under way. Jim Latshaw and Bill Tibbetts 

 sold wood at Victory, and Charley Ott, Pearl Oliver 

 and Jo Franzeni, at Bad Axe, also had wood boats and 

 were considered experts in loading it for sale. By put- 

 ting all crooked limb wood down in, and placing nice, 

 straight split wood on top, an expert could take thirteen 

 cords off the bank and make a good showing of what 

 measured eighteen to twenty cords in the flat boat. 



John Witte had a good yard at Brownsville, and 

 there were others at Hammond Chute, Queen's Bluff, 

 The Stone House (above Winona), Fountain City, 

 Richtman's, Belvidere, and West Newton. John Harry 

 had wood in flats at Alma. Above Lake Pepin, we 



